


Devil Gonna Follow Me E'er I Go

by BewareTheIdes15



Category: Justified
Genre: Alternate Universe, Blood Drinking, Complicated Relationships, Frottage, High School, M/M, Monsters, Outdoor Sex, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-07
Updated: 2018-03-07
Packaged: 2019-03-28 07:49:14
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,285
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13899573
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BewareTheIdes15/pseuds/BewareTheIdes15
Summary: Raylan’s always figured that if there’s such a thing as a circle of hell, Harlan might as well be one. They’ve sure as shit got the demons.





	Devil Gonna Follow Me E'er I Go

**Author's Note:**

> In which I avoid writing the fic I'm actually supposed to be working on by creating a weird vampire AU for a show that ended three years ago. 
> 
> I'm calling these vampires because that's the idea I was riffing off of and it's the easiest touchstone, but I've taken quite a few liberties with the details of the lore and no one in the fic actually identifies by the term "vampire". Make of that what you will. 
> 
> Title from "Barton Hollow" by The Civil Wars.
> 
> Age note: The characters never specifically state their ages, but they are in high school and to my mind are ~17. There is also a brief, non-explicit allusion to sex at a younger age toward the very end of the fic, if that's a squick for you.

Night-cold bites at Raylan’s exposed arms, stings against the blood-hot swelling that’s slowly closing off his left eye. Air sticky with the scent of sweetgum and pine clings to him like cobwebs, along with the trace of Helen’s stale Marlboros and the indistinct whiff a still a ways in the distance. It’s too early in the season for cicadas, the first few ambitious climbers sending their haunted scree through the hills like a hazy, high-pitched moan of the damned. 

Raylan’s always figured if there’s such a thing as a circle of hell, Harlan might just as well be one. They’ve sure as shit got the demons. 

“I did try to warn you,” Boyd says softly, hands shoved so deep into the pockets of a ratty old sweater that looks like he stole it off somebody’s granddaddy that Raylan can see the shape of his knuckles from the other side. His eyes don’t exactly gleam like a cat’s in the light spilling out of the kitchen window but nobody looking would mistake him for a regular high school kid either. 

Why the hell Raylan thought coming out here would make him feel better is beyond him.

Not that he’s got a wealth of options in that department. Helen’s up at the hospital trying to hash things out with Mags. Arlo could be anywhere, drinking, or fucking, or holding somebody up like a goddamn hillbilly mobster for all Raylan knows, but seeing how the rest of the day has gone, he’s probably camped out in his split-seamed armchair waiting for Raylan to turn up so he can gloat. Audrey’s or a puddle would mean liquor and people, and Raylan’s genuinely not sure what he’s going to do if somebody fucking congratulates him right now, let alone if they get up in his face. 

Still, rolling up on Crowder land is a special kind of stupid all its own. Or maybe just a special kind of desperate. 

“That Dickie was gonna try to crack my skull with a brushback?” he bites out, slapping his hand against the trunk of a tree instead of Boyd’s irritatingly placid face. The sting does exactly fuck all to drown out the phantom echo of his bat striking flesh. “Somehow I think I’d’ve remembered that.”

The tiniest puff of breath snorts out of Boyd’s nose, like he’s holding on to a sigh by the scruff of the neck. 

“Raylan, I know you do not truly believe that wiry squirrel-fucker has the juice to bust a batting helmet without a little something extra in his veins.”

There’s places in the world - California, and Michigan, and fucking Timbuktu - where hearing it like that would mean steroids, HGH - hell, even just straight up speed. Raylan might not be able to point to Timbuktu on a map, but he knows better than to think weak excuses like those could pass. Not in Harlan, at any rate. Not for people who’ve seen the genuine article.  

“Yeah, so what?” 

Pushing off of the back of the house with this body roll that would look kind of smooth and James Dean-cool if Raylan didn’t know that he was doing it for precisely that reason, Boyd takes a couple of cautious steps in Raylan’s direction. Not so much like he’s afraid of Raylan beating him to a red, squishy pulp - which he could; whatever else Boyd can do, Raylan could absolutely beat the tar out of him if he really put his mind to it; pay for it in spades after, but it could be done - as it is like he’s coming up on a fawn about to bolt.  

“So, I’m saying it would have been a fairer fight if you’d just let your oldest and dearest friend in the whole wide world give you a pre-game helping hand.”

Indignant heat rushing along under Raylan’s skin just makes the pain in the side of his face worse, temple throbbing in time with his heartbeat, anger making the very tips of his fingers flutter like a hummingbird’s pulse. 

At this distance he can fucking  _ see _ Boyd’s pupils dilate from it. 

“Because fairness has always been your top priority,” he scoffs, refusing the back up an inch even with that panicky prey-animal part of his brain sending up warnings like signal flares.  

He’s not afraid of Boyd. He’s never been afraid of Boyd. Which is why, whatever bullshit Boyd may spew about oldest and dearest, Raylan really is the best friend Boyd has - because Raylan’s the only kid in all of Harlan County too dumb to listen when his mama told him not to hang around those Crowder boys. 

Or maybe just the only one who never expected to hit twenty. 

“Let me fix that for you, sweet’nin’.” 

Boyd’s voice is molasses-heavy, lilting, plucking at Raylan’s thoughts like pulled stitches. Nothing at all like the touch he ghosts, so gentle it barely hurts at all, over the bruised side of Raylan’s face. 

Raylan fucking hates that shit. Hates how it makes him feel all breathless and soft-edged and  _ good _ right now, when half the Bennett clan could come riding over the hill any minute to exact unholy retribution. How Boyd’s not even doing it on purpose and it still winds around him like something made of smoke and claws. 

“I’m fine,” Raylan snaps, batting Boyd’s hand away and circling around to pace back to the treeline. As if proximity’s the real issue here. He’s seen what Bo can do with the power pent up under his skin, all the times Arlo dragged him along on whatever Crowder business was lining his pocket that week; breathing down your neck or squaring up at a hundred paces, the outcome doesn’t change. Boyd’s better at it than his daddy. Stronger. Boyd can get a whole room eating out of the palm of his hand just by showing up and sermonizing. Boyd can get the girls taught to know better than screwing a Crowder begging for the chance just by looking their way; can get the guys the staties call backup to bring in following like trained dogs. 

Boyd says he’s the strongest Crowder in twenty generations, and Raylan’s never found a reason to doubt it. 

“Why don’t you go fix Dickie up instead,” he spits as an afterthought. Even as it’s coming out of his mouth he can’t tell whether it was a taunt or a suggestion. Warding off a bloodfeud would be a lot easier if Mags’ middle child could do it on two good legs. 

Still. Fucking Dickie. 

“Not for all the pot in Bennett,” Boyd grins, all bright, white teeth and this twitch like murder in his pocketed fingers. “Bowman ain’t gonna either. Daddy’s up in arms at him for sticking his teeth in that puffed up little peckerwood in first place, don’t care how much scratch he offered for the opportunity.” 

He posts up against a tree, head tipped back to show off the long, tan stretch of his neck, pulling his hands free to hang down loose at his sides. 

Boyd Crowder is far from subtle. It wouldn’t bug Raylan so damn bad if it didn’t work like a charm. 

“But he’s just fine with me hanging around your backyard,” Raylan sniffs, remembering to fight the urge to lick his lips about five seconds after he’s already gone and done it, left side of his face giving another throb of protest at the movement.

He can feel his body revving up, the adrenaline from the game and the fight and the  _ pain _ still swirling around in him like gasoline fumes with nothing done to burn them off.  _ Fight. Fuck. Both _ , it’s saying - this insinuating little whisper at the back of his head that he’d just love to blame on Boyd, even though he knows better. Knows it doesn’t work like that. 

Whatever the Crowders are, whatever they do that sends people crawling to them on their knees and running for the hills after, it’s feral, carnal even, but it’s not magic - at least not anymore than the smell of a steak in the pan or the sight of Lindsay Bonner’s tits is magic. It’s the body. The raw, basic craving to be more. It’s the chance to taste life from the top of the foodchain, if only for a while. 

It’s at least part of the reason that Raylan wants Boyd so bad he can feel himself shaking with it sometimes, but he’s honest enough to admit that’s not even close to all of it. 

Boyd’s still grinning at him, relaxed and easy in everything but his eerie, predator’s eyes. 

“You’re Harlan blood, son,” Boyd says, shrugging off that one little unacknowledged truth like it’s nothing: There’s a reason Bo never brings Boyd to heel like he does Bowman; Raylan’s been wondering how long it’s going to take before everybody realizes it’s because he can’t. 

“And a Givens.”

“Yeah.” Boyd lifts his head, staring straight into Raylan with an absolute focus that makes the whole rest of the world seem bland and rinky-dink by comparison. “And there’s nobody ever gonna say a cross word about it. I won’t stand for that shit, not about you.” 

Maybe it makes him a little crazy, that stare. Maybe it’s Helen’s worry, and everyone else’s horror and the sneer he can already see on Arlo’s face - “Thought you you were hot shit, didn’t you, boy? Gone and fucked it up good now. Go ahead and kiss them scholarship dreams goodbye.” Or, shit, maybe he’s been goddamn certifiable all along - that’d come the closest to explaining why his search for a safe haven had brought him to the doorstep of Boyd fucking Crowder of all people, the sound of Dickie Bennett’s kneecap collapsing in on itself playing on a loop in his head and his dick half hard in his jeans just from the shape of Boyd’s smile. 

Bound to be one of those, since he’d  _ have _ to be crazy to open up his mouth and hiss, “And why is that, Boyd? I ain’t special. Hell, baseball’s the only fucking thing I ever been good at and I’ll probably be benched for the season,” because this is so spectacularly not the time to deal that particular wormcan of inadequacies he doesn’t even know where to start. 

Boyd does. Boyd knows exactly where to start and apparently it’s shoving Raylan up against a tree and snarling in his face in a way human vocal chords just flat-out can’t. 

“I do believe I just said I wouldn’t stand for that shit, Raylan,” he says, low and deadly and only the slightest bit slurred by the sharp edges of that second set of teeth creeping down to show behind the first. “You are the finest thing that ever walked this holler and I will not again hear that reputation maligned by your own tongue, however fond of that particular organ I may be.”

And yeah, Raylan is fucking insane, how the shit has he survived this long in the first place with instincts that tell him to do deranged things like take the hard dump of fear-anger-want that floods his system and use it to shove right back at Boyd, gaining himself a couple of inches of space and a screaming pain that flares through his bruised skin when he tries on a snarl of his own.

“Get off me!”

The heavy rubber of Raylan’s boot sole grates over a shallow root, all of the air punched right out of his lungs by the shoulder Boyd plants in the center of his chest, ramming him right back up against the hard edges of treebark. The side of Boyd’s face digs right up against his, hot skin and mean stubble against the swelling like a parody of a caress. The jolt of it takes the little bit of the breath that Raylan managed to suck back in and shreds it like wet paper, this sad, wounded wheeze coming out instead of the  _ fuck you _ he means as Boyd grunts and works to keep Raylan’s struggling limbs pinned. 

“You want to know why?” he huffs, almost as breathless as Raylan. “I love you, Raylan Givens. I love your Hollywood starlet beauty mark,” lips swipe across the spot under his eye where his mole would probably be if it weren’t puffed up to the size of a peach just now. 

“And your sinful mouth.” The very tip of Boyd’s tongue swipes at the edge of his bottom lip. Raylan tries to bite it on impulse, teeth clacking on empty air because, again, Raylan is an incredibly stupid person and one day his body is going to have to wise up and fucking listen to him instead of just doing things without his consciousness giving the go-ahead. 

“And all of the ornery shit that comes flying out of it when you get riled up,” Boyd laughs, pressing their foreheads together so Raylan’s got no choice but to stare into his eyes from way too close up - green and brown and light-reflecting mirrored-silver taking up his whole field of vision. “I love that you look at me like you’d shoot me dead without thinking twice. I love that you’re scared of me and too goddamn snake-mean to notice it.” 

Raylan’s muscles are burning like he marinated them in battery acid, a full seven innings behind him before he tried making ground beef out of Dickie’s knee. He’s not stopping, really, he’s just catching his breath, fighting smart, not hard. 

Rocking into it a little bit when Boyd presses a leg between his thighs and gives him something firm to rub against; lets him feel the weight of Boyd’s cock through both of their jeans.

Possibly moans just a little. 

“I love how your dick gets wet when I sidle up real close,” Boyd murmurs like a dare. Takes his time catching Raylan’s bottom lip between smooth, blunt teeth, sharp hidden ones just behind pressing almost - almost - hard enough to break the skin. Raylan couldn’t for the life of his say whether he’s spiteful of just plain horny when he pulls back hard enough to take ‘almost’ out of the equation. 

Pinpricks of blood stain his tongue iron-salty and this time there’s definitely a moan and it’s definitely Boyd who makes it, throaty and broken and hotter than any porn Raylan’s ever been privy to. 

“I love that you don’t give a shit what I am, and I love that you want me so much anyway.” His hand comes up to settle against the unmarred side of Raylan’s face, tip his head so their mouths press together just so, sharing breath. 

The tip of his tongue is back, tracing along the inside of Raylan’s bottom lip, each little cut sizzling with that ecstatic thrill that ought to be pain and somehow isn’t - somehow isn’t really anything Raylan has a word for. 

When Raylan’s tongue follows after, there’s nothing left but shocky nerves and fresh, unbroken skin. 

“Now, take a little in for me, darlin’,” Boyd whispers, every syllable catching at Raylan’s lips like a tease. “Let me help you.”

Between the moment Raylan finally seals his mouth against Boyd’s and the one where he can feel the nature of him kick in, there are these strange, upside down seconds where it’s nothing but kissing. Great kissing. Throwing-Raylan’s-braincells-in-a-deepfryer-thats-how-good-it-is kissing. But still. 

It’s having Boyd like a regular person, or as close to regular as Boyd could ever be - genetics, or species, or whatever the fuck notwithstanding. There are days he feels like he’s living for it, those seconds where it’s nothing else at all, but then he thinks again and he figures there’s no _living_ _for_ anything, there’s just this - Boyd’s tongue in his mouth and Boyd’s body pressed against him and Boyd wanting him like the world’s going to come apart if there’s an extra molecule of space between them - _living_ , and all the minutes and hours and days in between having it where he forgets what it’s really like to be alive at all. 

He’s really fucking glad Boyd can’t read minds or any of that other shit monsters can do in horror movies, because if Boyd knew even half of the sappy, inane, poetic shit that scribbles itself across Raylan’s brain when they’re fucking he’d probably never let Raylan out of bed again. 

“You sing to me, Raylan. The sirens of the rock,” Boyd huffs, proving the point he didn’t even know Raylan was making and rubbing his clothed cock against Raylan’s hip like he means to get inside him the hard way. The motion grinds tree bark against Raylan’ back with every thrust, hard enough to draw blood, calves shaking when the force of it lifts him up onto his tiptoes. Raylan rocks right into it anyway. 

The wet fabric of his boxers, soaked through with precome and probably leaking onto his jeans by now, drags along the head of his cock like a live wire, every inch of his body awash in that shivery, prickling perfection that means all of the cuts and scrapes and bruises on him are sloughing off like old paint. 

“You show up here smelling like this, and feeling like this, and looking like this-” Fingers close around Raylan’s jaw, and he’s so far beyond being able to feel anything but Boyd and what he does to him, but he guesses his face must be back to normal because Boyd nuzzles in and kisses at the little mole by the corner of his eye like a long-absent lover. “How am I supposed to resist you?” 

And Raylan does not care, just genuinely does not give one single shit whether Boyd’s ever able to resist him, so long as he figures it out after Raylan gets to come like a fucking freight train. In his jeans for fuck’s sake, which is going to be hell later and it doesn’t matter. Nothing matters but this. Him and Boyd and the kind of sense that the world ever seems to make unless they’re sharing each other’s sweat. 

“You could burn the state up with the fire in you,” Boyd hisses like a prayer, hands tugging Raylan closer as if he could fuze them if he just pulled hard enough, “and I would bask in that glorious conflagration just to stand at your side.”

The look in Boyd’s eyes is hectic, glassy, that other part of him so close to the surface that the human skin over it seems almost transparent. 

Honest. Devoted. 

Raylan feels bad for every poor sap who ever scrimped and saved and whored themselves out to get the Crowders to heal them, make them stronger. They walked away whistling, thinking they knew what power felt like, and not a one of them had a clue. 

There is nothing in this life or the next that could ever be as potent as looking down at Boyd and knowing that he’d tear God himself down if Raylan asked it.

“Maybe I’d just burn you too,” Raylan says, surprisingly steady for how he can feel his body trembling like a leaf. He’s riding the razor-edge, wanting to tip over and wanting to go on just like this, screwing Boyd Crowder like the most beautiful sin ever committed until Judgement Day falls right down on their heads.

Boyd whines against Raylan’s collarbone, thorny teeth catching holes in cotton as he drags his mouth against Raylan’s t-shirt. 

“You already do, son. Burn me to a crisp.” 

He’s got a hand on Raylan’s ass, drawing him into it every time Boyd’s hips swivel down like a girl working a pole, the other hand planted firmly against the tree as if he needs some more fucking leverage when Raylan’s pretty damn sure they’ve about to fuck their way right through the damn thing. 

His nerves are shimmering, every brush of cloth and skid of skin a flawless little burst of pleasure crunching between his molars, and there’s really only one thing he can think of that would make it better. Make it more. 

Gulping down another mouthful of cold air, Raylan lets his head fall back, fingers finding a hold in the wild crop of Boyd’s hair, waiting until Boyd’s face is nestled in the crook of his neck before he lets himself groan, “Come on.”

A sound that’s not exactly a whimper squeezes out of Boyd like the dregs of a toothpaste tube, like Raylan just did something terrible to him and he really fucking liked it, and then there’s the brutal, candied ache of teeth sinking into his skin. 

White sparks go off behind Raylan’s eyelids, everything in him coalescing and narrowing down on the pressure of Boyd’s thigh against his cock and the greedy suck of Boyd’s mouth at his neck, the two sensations forming a feedback loop until Raylan can’t tell what’s what and nothing in the world could make him care less because he’s coming with his whole fucking body, a Fourth of July fireworks extravaganza going off over every square inch. 

He’s never entirely sure how long Boyd spends using him as a juice box; a reality so gut-wrenching he already knows he’s going to break into a cold sweat over it at some point in the next few days, swear he’ll never let it happen again and mean it, right up until he doesn’t. It’s an old, old pattern. Maybe one he’d feel slightly more compelled to break if Boyd had ever once snuck a taste that Raylan didn’t specifically ask for. Then again, maybe not. If nothing else, Raylan has definitively proven that he’s incapable of making safe, rational decisions where Boyd Crowder is concerned. 

Any which way, he figures it can’t be all that long since the come slicking up the inside of his underwear is still warm when he surfaces from that dreamy, rhapsodic fog. Boyd’s busy fondling the stretch of Raylan’s neck where he knows he’ll find fresh, unbroken skin and nary a sign that he just had a full set of fangs shoved into him - kissing and licking and nuzzling into it like a touch-starved dog. 

Boyd’s not really possessive, not in the way Raylan might would have guessed if he’d grown up on Dracula movies or whatever the nearest appropriate analogue for the Crowders is. He doesn’t seem particularly fussed if Raylan dates or screws around or anything like that - though he’s never felt compelled to see what would happen if he started making noises about getting serious with somebody else.

But this? This is all Boyd’s. A spot he can lay his hands on when they’re out in the world - perfectly fine when the last place he bit is low on Raylan’s neck, awkward when he decides to snack on the inner thigh - and claim him, even if nobody but the two of them know that’s what he’s doing. It’s sort of creepy. Also sort of hot. Raylan’s working on getting right with it. 

Along with the couple dozen other things he needs to get right with, like, right fucking now. Shit. 

“You know, this didn’t actually solve any of my problems,” Raylan sighs, leaning his weight against the tree while he toys with Boyd’s hair. 

“‘Course it did,” Boyd mumbles, laving a long stripe up the tendon in Raylan’s neck. “You look a sight less liable to kneecap anybody else than when you turned up.” He halts, pressing a tender, dirty kiss into still-sensitive new skin. “I’m good for your self-control, sweet’nin’.” 

“You know, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard you tell a more outrageous lie.” Raylan tries for grousing but he can feel the way the slightly giddy curve of his mouth ruins it. “And that’s saying something.” 

The mess in his jeans is just starting to get uncomfortable - which speaks volumes to how much fun his ride out of here is going to be - and he still isn’t really sure where he’s better off weathering this - there’s a lot of low cards in that hand - but people are eventually going to notice if he doesn’t turn up somewhere. And he sure as shit doesn’t want Helen driving up to the Crowder place and finding him hunkered down with Boyd - what she does or does not believe about Raylan’s relationship with Boyd does not need Raylan’s come-sticky jeans for confirmation - so he supposes he’s going to actually have to go deal with things now, miserable as that sounds. 

Gingerly reclaiming his neck from Boyd’s tenderest mercies, Raylan starts pulling himself back together. Thankfully his keys are still in the pocket of the letterman jacket he’d chucked into the woods when he couldn’t stand to look at it anymore instead of scattered among the leaf litter. He’s really feeling no particular need to do a lot of scrabbling around on the ground until he’d got a change of clothes handy. 

The jacket also helps - while his back may have come out of the ordeal no worse for wear, he’s got a feeling questions might crop up if anyone were to catch a look at the back of his t-shirt. 

“It’s all gonna be fine, sugar,” Boyd says, coming up beside him. His voice is back to the calm, measured tone he started with, even if he is busy slipping his ice cube hands up the back of Raylan’s shirt under his jacket and tucking himself into it like they’re slow dancing - some kind of messed up, demonic version of Jack and Diane. Raylan sort of hates the way his dick obediently tries to perk up about it - being predictable is vastly overrated. “You and me, that comes with more fringe benefits than my sexy body and impeccable taste in music.”

Raylan’s stomach takes a weightless dip, that warm, post-Boyd rush turning frigid as a winter morning in his veins. 

“Boyd.”

“Raylan.”

“You cannot do anything to the Bennetts,” he grips Boyd through the soft, pilling shoulder of his sweater, glares right into those big nocturnal eyes and tries like hell to convey exactly how fucking serious he is. “We’re trying not to start a damn war, remember.”

Boyd just smirks. 

“Far be it from me to point out the hypocrisy in  _ you _ making that statement, my love, but I am not intent on taking action until there’s some action that requires taking.”

Fighting off the cozy, doped up feeling that’s trying to slink up the back of his neck - Boyd and his fucking narcotic pheromones - Raylan grumbles, “I think you’re just saying words now.” 

“You’re precious when you’re experiencing bloodloss,” Boyd hums, pressing safe, blunt teeth against the line of Raylan’s jaw.

“I’m serious, Boyd. Do not go after the Bennetts.”

Warm breath spreads against Raylan’s neck in a slow, leaking sigh. Boyd steps back slowly, running one wistful hand down the center of Raylan’s chest before letting the chilly night air flood into his vacated space. 

The tips of Raylan’s fingers tangle briefly in the hem of Boyd’s sweater, impulses shot to hell all over again by thirty seconds of contact. Raylan shoves them punishingly into his jacket pockets until they learn how to behave themselves. 

“You have my word that I will not start anything until, and unless, the situation becomes needful,” Boyd intones solemnly. “However, if it comes down to you or the Bennetts, that aint no choice where I’m concerned, Raylan, that’s just facts. Please don’t make me promise otherwise, for it would sorely pain me to break a vow to you.”

His face is nearly blank, a hundred years of Harlan defiance packed into the tension around his mouth and the stiff line of his shoulders. All those fucking people weaned on the stories of Crowder monsters and not one person in this God-forsaken holler seems to understand it’s got nothing to do with what Boyd is. Plain old human or ram-headed devil spawn, Boyd is a monster because he was born and bred for it, violence watering the roots of his family tree. Just like every other body who ever claimed a piece of Harlan soil. 

How Raylan managed to trick all of that into falling for him is almost as mystifying as how either one of them is going to survive it. 

“Just- Just let me find out what’s going on,” Raylan exhales, the precise arch of Helen’s eyebrow when he turns up at her place without a mark on him already vivid in his mind. “I’ll call you.”

With an amiable nod that Raylan doesn’t trust for a second, Boyd agrees, trailing after Raylan as he fishes the keys out of his pocket and climbs up onto the truck’s creaking bench seat.

_ I’m going to be with you until the stars burn out, Raylan Givens,  _ Boyd had whispered in the sweaty aftermath of the first time; ticklish and breathy and more erotic than anything Raylan had ever felt in all of his wild and worldly thirteen years. _ Until the day they lower us into the same grave. There’s not power enough on heaven or earth to keep me from it.  _ Raylan had twisted his body closer on the rucked up quilt they were using as a picnic blanket and clung to him, heart beating so hard he’d thought it was going to crack right through his ribs. From that day to this he’s still not sure if it was because he was so happy or so fucking terrified. 

“I’ll call you,” he says again, unnecessarily - wrongfooted like he always feels driving away from Boyd. He’s sure it says something about him that the place he feels safest is surrounded by teeth and blood. Possibly just that old familiar deathwish reasserting itself.

“Take care, Raylan.” Boyd clunks the driver’s side door shut for him and splays a long, lean hand over the edge of it through the open window, fingers just brushing the side of Raylan’s arm. Just for a moment, and then he’s patting the dinged up steel siding like a prize steed, gifting Ralyan another one of those mild, knowing smiles as Raylan cranks the engine back to life. 

“Goodnight Boyd,” he says, barely audible over the rumble, swinging around to keep an eye on that one oak with the broken branch that’s just the right height to scrape a racing stripe all the way down the side of the truck as he backs out of the makeshift drive. 

There’s movement behind the windows of the house, bulk shifting across the stained yellow light that could just as easily be Bo or Bowman. Raylan’s never bothered to ask if Crowder hearing is any better than a human’s - he’s not entirely sure his dignity could withstand the answer.

The temperature has dropped a few degrees since he made the trip up, easterly wind blowing up through the rolled-down window cold enough to sting his cheeks. He keeps it down anyway as he pulls away from the house; lets the air serve like a strong cup of coffee after too much shine. 

His blood is thrumming, bones pitched like tuning forks as his body uses what Boyd gave him to renew what he took; that heady, dangerously persuasive strength building in on itself, telling him he can do anything, handle anything that comes his direction. Six hours ago Dickie Bennett must have made this same drive, feeling this same way, and look how fucking well that turned out for him. 

Then again, Dickie couldn’t have looked in his rearview and seen two little pinpricks of silver just off to the side of the house, watching for him until he disappeared around the curve. 

Dickie might have made a deal with a devil, but he’ll never know what it means to keep one.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm on [tumblr](http://bewaretheides315.tumblr.com/)! Come watch me wildly oscillate through fandoms with no logic or remorse.


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